Every year it's the same story – the migrant hawker (Aeshna mixta) dragonflies arrive in July hunting en masse, but refuse to land for even a moment, making photos nigh on impossible 🤷♂️
And then around the start of August, they start perching & allow me to get very close 👁
So here's a male that was making the most of the post-rain sunshine this evening 🙂👍
I live in an apartment building & my landlord kindly allows me to garden. A neighbor approached me about starting some vegetables so we've added some heirloom tomatoes, sweet peppers, kale, & turnips along with some purple basil to my flower garden. We've got our 1st tomato and peppers forming👍
(06/24/23)
It hasn't been a great year for dragonflies for some reason, so I was happy to see this female vagrant darter (Sympetrum vulgatum) this morning, perched on one of the bamboo sticks I have out in the garden for them 🐲🪰
Unlike some of their cousins, they love to pose for the camera 📷🙂👍
Ruby-tailed wasp, possibly Chrysis ignita. I saw this little creature buzzing over an old stone wall, crawling into all nooks and crannies - clearly searching for something. Described as a cuckoo wasp - it will lay its eggs in the nests of solitary mason bees...
I mowed the lawn today just to keep it under control. The #CompostBins have a whole community of #fauna and #fungi in them but as soon as you lift the lid and expose them to bright #sunshine, they scurry away looking to retain moisture and out of the sight of likely predators like birds. It’s difficult to get a good #photograph of any #arthropods.
However, I did manage to capture an image of this #woodlouse.
If you're a regular viewer, you won't be surprised to learn that I have a bit of an obsession with photographing the dragonflies in our garden 🐲🪰
Every picture is different & often challenging to capture, but sometimes true magic happens 🧙♂️
For me, this is one of those photos, a female common darter (Sympetrum striolatum) caught in the light & with just the right amount of depth of focus 🙂
Found some lovely branches covered in lichen today. This Golden-eye lichen (Teloschistes chrysophthalmus) looks like clusters of tiny yellow mouths (or eyes, or sunflowers).
I'm seeing these things everywhere now I'm getting to know what to look for.
One of the huge purple flowers that our globe artichoke puts out. Last night it had 7 bumblebees on it but by the time I came back with my camera they'd all gone...
The first crocuses have just popped in my friend's garden. Mine are not too far behind. Here's a little thread of the early ones from his yard.
(02/24/24)
This tiny insect measured less than 1 millimeter, I think it is a type of cicada, I was very surprised by the comet-like tail it had. #macrophotography#nature#bugs#insects